


outtakes from the Bordelon fairytale

by youngerdrgrey



Category: Queen Sugar (TV)
Genre: F/F, Femslash February, Femslash February 2017, Femslash February Celebrates Black Women
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-03
Updated: 2017-02-03
Packaged: 2018-09-21 17:30:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9559697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youngerdrgrey/pseuds/youngerdrgrey
Summary: Sure, Charley and Davis started off with a fairytale, but they forgot about how awful sequels turned out to be. The couple in the first breaks up, and whoever does the comforting tends to be the new prince by book's end. Or, princess, as the case may be./or,the time Lena helps Charley tackle the truth about Davis' infidelity





	

**Author's Note:**

> **written for** day 21 of 30 x 31 writing challenge; **prompt:** fairytale au (each taken as separate words in this case)
> 
> .
> 
> **AU** in the way that Ernest doesn't die, so Charley stays in LA during the madness

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**i. the curse is broken, the truth revealed**

 

_"You're a liar, Davis! LIAR! WHAT DID YOU DO!?"_

 

Security carries Charley the whole of the way off the court and out through the players' entrance. The second those doors close, she rounds at them. Snaps, "Get Micah!" Her teeth slam so hard they click. And she repeats it until they go back and get her son. "Get Micah! Bring him to me. You want me to go get him? I'll go back out there. Get me Micah!"

But Micah rushes through the doors before they can even go. And in the background, as he runs to her with his arms outstretched, she sees Davis, shifting his weight from one side to the other, scratching at his hand like he can't quite understand how they got here.

"Mom!"

Micah barrels into her. She stumbles back, but her grip on him stays firm. Tight around his shaking shoulders even as hers do the same. Her face finds the crook of his neck, and she scratches at his arms, his back, whatever she can get to. 

"I got you. It's okay. I got you." The doors to the players' entrance swing closed, but the rush of the crowd keeps roaring on the other side. The chanting, the boos. Charley pulls back enough to look down at Micah. Squeezes her arms around him. "Let's go."

She wants to say home, but the word catches in her throat. She can't dislodge it and hold back her tears at the same time, so she doesn't say anything else. Not until they're in the parking garage and she tells him to just turn his phone off. They're not answering any questions today, not from anyone.

 

(She winds up with over forty missed calls. From Davis, Miriam, Lena, even Nova's broken their silence to check on her.

Nova sounds lost though, a little uncomfortable, like the words strain against the veins in her neck as she says them. "Hey sis, just checking in. I'm not gon' pretend I'm not calling because of the Davis of it all, but if you need to talk about anything, my ringer's up."

The phone autoplays the next message. Davis, with his shaking voice. "Baby, please, talk to me. I didn't do this. I did not rape her, Charley. I swear to you. Please, baby, call me back."

And Micah must hear the message, or must feel the tension in her jaw and the rest of her. He takes her hand in his and doesn't let go until they get home.)

 

/

 

**ii. a kind helper appears**

Lena shows up at the house with a Trader Joe's bag filled with margarita supplies. Charley bites down the joke about Lena's past as a bartender and steps aside to let her in.

"I didn't expect to see you," Charley says. She could've added a classifier, like  _so soon_ or  _in person,_ but honestly they all apply. She and Lena aren't exactly unplanned drinking kind of friends, especially not in times of trouble, but here they are, bottles clinking as Lena toes off her heels near the shoe rack.

"I got sick of waiting for you to leave the house." Lena throws a glance Charley's way, and Charley has to circle her jaw to keep from snapping back. It's not an unwarranted comment anyway. Charley's left the house once in the whole of the last three days, and it was just to help Micah get back through the media chaos when he'd gone to get his girlfriend.

It's not like the outside world has much for her right now. Micah's here, her family's safe in their part of the country, and Davis.... She's got his false apologies and weak explanations coming from all directions now. He'd sent her an email because she'd taken her phone and hid out in their wine cellar for the whole time he was home. A few replies later, and they'd agreed he could stay in the guest room on the other side of the house and that he was  _not_  to speak to her for any reason right now. He was to ignore any and every reporter with a question about his marriage, his family, and his compliance in the rape of the twenty-three year old accuser. Oh, and if he so much as thought about going into their bedroom, she'd be taking Micah and going to stay with her Aunt Violet until this whole situation died down.

Lena takes in the house from her spot. Most of their walls are glass, so it's pretty easy to tell that no one else is wandering around. "I take it Davis isn't staying at the house."

Rather than answering, Charley leads the way towards the kitchen. "Is Felix?"

Lena laughs. "If I kicked him out every time he did something stupid, I'd be living alone." She sets the bag on the counter and pulls out ingredients. A small bag of limes, tequila, a trashy gossip magazine. She holds that last one. "I figured we could laugh about it after a few drinks."

The cover's a shot of Charley on the court, arms and legs thrashing to hit Davis, while he gives her that same confused look he's been wearing for a week now. She doesn't need to ask to know that her claims of respectability are gone with that. She plucks the magazine from Lena's hand anyway.

"Maybe more than a few."

"Then let's get to it. I know you'd prefer the juice be fresh, so, what can I use to squeeze these?" She starts pulling open drawers before the question's even out of her mouth. Charley watches, but there's no point in answering when Lena's only one drawer away from finding the strainer herself. And Lena hoists it up triumphantly once she does find it. She catches herself right after and sends a more restrained smile towards Charley. At least that hasn't changed.

The other girls -- other wives with husbands fresh out of college and no experience at navigating this level of attention -- they all watch Charley like she's their choreographer, going over the motions too quick for the beginners and just fast enough that the eager ones can shine. Lena shines, when she wants to, and she'd been one of the first to stand beside her husband once Charley gave the marching order. But Lena knew what kind of man Felix was, knew how likely it was that he'd at least engaged in something with this accuser, but she hadn't missed a step.

Charley turns to go to the cabinets near the sink. "I'll get the glasses."

"Let me. Just sit back in one of these  _gorgeous_ stools," and Lena even turns a stool out along the island, so Charley makes her way to it, "and I'll show you how I got through until Felix made it big."

And it's easy to smile at that, to tuck her snide comments and doubts and fears into the corners of her lips, and settle down onto the bar stools that had been custom ordered to match their kitchen island. Easy to let herself pretend that a few drinks with an eager friend can make all of this go away.

Lena tugs open a cabinet for the glasses -- two, matching -- and spots the simple syrup right under it. She spins around with her finds, and her top pulls up and away from her jeans. A little sliver of skin to match the little smirk on her lips. She says, "The regulars loved me. You should've seen them, cheering for me like a bunch of groupies at an away game."

Was their accuser from an away game? One of those girls who buys a jersey and ties it to show off her belly ring? The ones who put on underwear in team colors but don't paint numbers on themselves so they're open to any player who picks them from the crowd?

Charley blinks back to the moment. "I've never been one to cheer." Not for anyone but Davis.

But Lena grins with a tilt of her head and plops everything onto the island. "After a few of these, trust me, you'll be singing my name." There's something in the snag of her lips as she says it, and Charley can't tell if it's a promise or a warning. Can't tell if it's light, like casual greetings and pecks on the cheek before brunch, or something more, like the double take Lena does at team events. When there's too many people to notice everything, but somehow Charley always catches Lena's eyes lingering on her. Normally caught somewhere around her lips or her cheekbones, never anywhere indecent but a bit too personal to be completely innocent.

She should let it go. But she finds herself leaning into her elbows on the tabletop, cheeks rising to look up to where Lena stands on the other end. Her voice comes out lower than expected. "Should I sing Lena, or would you prefer Mrs. Evans?" And the lower level gives her the perfect view of Lena's face, as eyes widen and lips quake around a grin that dries instantly.

Lena's voice even shakes, as she struggles to hold the eye contact. Has to glance down to her materials instead of facing Charley any longer. "I'll let you know."

 

/

 

**iii. a want revealed**

Lena rests back against the ground by the pool. Feet dangling in the water, jeans just soaking at this point because there's no way that pants that tight can roll anywhere higher than mid-calf. She eyes the couch wistfully, and Charley sips drink number four instead of acknowledging it.

The couch is off limits seeing as the last time she sat on the couch, she fucked her rapist husband. Wrapped herself around him and shed every ounce of protection and deniability. Promised to follow him anywhere he needed to get that fifth ring, which apparently now would mean a court room, or to a settlement if that'll actually work out. But what's the point in a settlement if her husband's culpable? To save the brand? To keep them from losing every endorsement and give Davis a shot at a future career? She's disavowed other men who've been accused of assault. She's cut them from the names of people she's willing to support, or let Davis support, and here she is, standing beside them in press conferences and trying to fight them on the court.

She could laugh. She should laugh. How the mighty have fallen, right? "I thought you were supposed to bring the catfights and the hair pulling." Back when Charley would bring the romance to a reality show centered on them. When things were easy, just a day ago.

Lena does laugh. "You beat me to it," she says, which is better than the response Charley's conjuring up. Charley's brain supplies an image of hair pulling, but it's relatively nondescript, just manicured nails like claws yanking. And Charley has to lie back against the ground too.

The sun should be setting soon, and then it'll be too bright with the sun glinting on the water. They'll have to go back into the house, maybe see Davis. He'd walked by earlier. Charley heard the footsteps even as he tried moving quietly. Lena had glared at Davis the whole of his way through the hall, and then she'd downed her drink and refilled both their glasses. If he'd gone back through, they'd missed it, too lost in the bad jokes Lena told to cover up the tension. But there won't be much they can do if they're all in the same room. If Charley has to physically and actually acknowledge him.

"How do you do it?" Charley asks her question to the sky, but Lena perks up in her peripheral vision. "Stay with Felix? Forgive him when he... finds someone else?" Because at this point, maybe that's all Davis did. He's been telling her for days that he wasn't with anyone that night, that he'd come home because that's the night Micah got sick and they'd been so worried he had something wrong with his lungs because he couldn't breathe right. So maybe, maybe he's only cheated once. Maybe it's forgivable.

Lena rolls her head from one side to the other. "I don't know if you'll like my way." She hums from the back of her throat. "But the way I see it, is if he can do it, so can I. I don't have a lot of other options." Financially, she means, not unless she wants to go back to bartending and barely skirting by. "So, we just call it even. Do what we want with who we want so long as it's quiet."

The sex or -- nope, not the sex, the fact that they're having it. Charley needs to slow down on the drinking. She's getting fuzzy. Less appropriate, less cultured, and that's what Lena comes to her for, isn't it? Culture and class and just a dash of possibility.

There've been a few times when Charley's caught Lena looking and she's played into it, just a bit; a quirk of the lips, a shift that gets the slit of her dress to inch higher, or that one time when she'd spent too many away games with Lena and the boys came home just for a charity event, and Charley'd seen the looks, the gulps, and she'd turned into Davis, ghosted her nails down his neck, kissed the side of his jaw, and turned back. He'd pulled her flush against him, hands at her hips, and ducked down to whisper in her ear everything he'd missed about her, how he planned to make up his absence while Micah was away. And she'd heard every word he said with her eyes locked on Lena's, even as she cocked her head to the side and let Davis start on a few of those promises. As she felt that familiar pull at her navel and finally just let her eyes come closed.

Presently, Charley sputters. Coughs and has to roll onto her side. Lena's lipstick's faded, rubbed off along the rim of the glass. Charley closes her eyes again. They'd been talking about Felix, about him cheating and Lena getting even.

"So you just cheat back."

Lena grins. "I cheat better. He seems to go for such easy targets, you know? Women who fall at his feet and brag about him on their snap stories. If I were more petty, I don't know, I'd probably find the same girls, but--" she laughs, but the shake belays the humor, shows her nerves, "-- I like a challenge, you know? If I'm gonna do it, it's gonna be good for me. And I mean  _good_."

And Charley hears her, she does, but at least half of her brain stayed with the  _find the same girls_  and keeps playing the operative word over and over again. "So, you..." Charley honestly has to sit up. Brings herself back upright and finds her glass in her fist before she really even thinks about needing another drink. But she's glad that she has it. That she can have something to focus on other than the rush of blood in her ears and the actual confirmation that all of those moments weren't just a trick of the mind. They were real. Because Lena likes women, and Lena most certainly likes her.

Lena props herself up on her elbows. "I'm sorry." She's not. "Did that make you uncomfortable? I thought your sister was gay, plus it's L.A. So...." Her lashes flutter like it should be a given. And it is, it's just....

Charley sips a little too strong from her drink. "My sister's not gay." She nods at that, and Lena gives her this look like she's reaching too far. "She never uses a word for it, but she likes men. And women. Maybe other genders, I don't ask her questions if I don't need to. But she's not just gay."

"Good for her." Lena sits up then, and her feet slip up in the water. She angles her body towards Charley. Blinks at her with those endless eyes over a smile that reaches about as far as the sunset. "Look, Charley, I'm not telling you how to live your life. You want to go back in there and make up with him, do it. You want to get a divorce and never have to deal with any of this Gladiators business, go do that too. But if you want to focus on you, and what makes you feel good, then just know I'm here. Any time."

How had Charley described Lena earlier? She searches for the word while Lena keeps staring at her. Charley digs around the voyeuristic memories and the protective, possessive glare Lena'd sent at Davis. She wafts through the weird way she's been watching her friend and dodges the long while she'd spent marveling Lena's biceps when Lena squeezed the limes. Earlier, when she thought about being a choreographer, she'd thought of Lena as one of her dancers, strong and quick and -- oh -- eager.

From the tips of her lashes to the bated way she holds her breath, from the hitch in her throat down to the toes treading through the water to get out her nerves, Lena is nothing but eager. To have an answer, to have Charley. And she could probably have Charley in a way that would make her forget Davis. Could have Charley in a way that has her eyes shifting from Lena to the glass around them to nothing but the sky above their heads. And she'd learn exactly which name to sing. What pitch. What decibel.

But Charley couldn't do that. Not the way Lena could. It's not a healthy way to handle her feelings. It's cheap, and it's -- "I couldn't use you to get back at Davis."

Lena shrugs. "What are friends for?"

Charley snorts. Full on, and her hand flies to cover her mouth, her nose, and she laughs again because, honestly, "I've never had a friend like that." Never known anyone willing to let themselves be used just to make her happy. She shouldn't like that, right? Shouldn't feel flattered, or fascinated by the offer. Using people's not okay, even if it is technically something she's had to do before. This -- using Lena would be different. Sex might be nothing to Lena, but Charley's never been with anyone but Davis. Never had sex without love, and she probably couldn't separate the two if she wanted to. "I can't -- I wouldn't know--" what to do, how to act, how to "--anything."

She shouldn't admit something like that, not to someone so obviously well-versed in getting her way. Certainly not to someone she's been training either.

But Lena doesn't pounce on the information. Lena doesn't even bat an eye. "I could teach you. If you wanted."

There it is again, this recurring theme -- if she wanted, if she needs this -- so much of what's happened the last few days has been about the team, about Davis. Even before that, maybe a bit too much of her life has centered on him and not enough on her lately. What does she want?

Right now, she wants to finish her drink. She wants to bathe in the warmth of Lena's stare and the heat radiating from the ground below. Then she wants to go back in, and slip onto the couch in the living room, maybe watch a movie with Micah and call her dad. She doesn't want this. Not today anyway. But another day? That could probably be arranged. Considered. Wanted.

Charley settles back down onto the ground. She says, "Maybe later, Lena." And Lena does falter then, eyes flashing and muscles twitching in her jaw and the arm still holding her up. Fear creeps into Lena's gaze, and a Charley free of all this might've reached out to soothe out away. Smooth it away with her hands to ridiculously soft cheeks and assurances passed in the space between their lips. But she's not free of this yet. Her robe's still under the couch from the last time she'd been with Davis.

Lena tries nodding. "O-okay."

Charley clarifies, "That's not a no. I'm not opposed to learning. I just have a lot to deal with first. You understand."

Lena doesn't. She couldn't possibly, but she nods with more vigor this time. So ready to take the out and slip past this moment. She shifts, sliding closer to Charley, and glances down on Charley's face.

"Whenever you do though...."

Charley's grin snags when she tries to smile. It is a promise. "I'll find you."

"Good." Lena lingers in the look. Then her smile blasts back to its normal, casual light. "You know Felix would crap his pants at the thought."

Charley can laugh at that. She tells herself not to think of what Davis would do with the thought of them. If maybe that's the kind of thing that these other women would do for him. If they'd let him watch while another woman or man touched them. Or if something like that could've saved her marriage even if it left her splayed at the edges. No, Charley tells herself to let it go for now and just laugh. Sometimes, that's all a girl can do.

 

/

 

**iv. a new deal is struck**

Charley follows the sound of Lena's voice through the club. She ignores the stares that follow behind her, the quick clicks of people's phones and the words that would be whispers if not for the excitement. Someone calls out her name, but Lena's the one to turn at the sound of it. Good thing Charley's actually here because that quick turn could've been embarrassing without a target.

Lena's smile doubles in size. The woman at her side lobs a glare Charley's way, and Charley just grins back. Lena rises to greet her. A quick hug, a peck on the cheek that lands too close to her lips to be solely accidental.

"Charley! Didn't expect to see you tonight." Or any night really. Lena's eyes stay on her, a little too wide and too focused to be casual. "Last I heard you were settling your divorce."

Charley nods. Wets her lips before she says, "It's settled. He's not happy, but apparently he hadn't been for a while so." Her eyebrows jet up, then back down as she smiles. And it is a smile, something light enough that no one would question it. "But I wanted to find you. You simply must teach me your ways."

And it's like a switch flips in Lena. All of that energy bubbles up, and she tilts her head back in a laugh. She wastes no time, spinning around to her guest. "I'm so sorry. I've got to help her out, but I can call you. Maybe." She almost laughs again, and Charley shakes her head to hide her own smile. "Sorry, again." Then she's right back with Charley, stepping up and motioning towards the door to the club.

Charley technically leads the way, and Lena stays close to her back. They almost giggle, the sheer impossibility of the moment passing between them like lightning. They get caught in a crowd, a mass of people dancing too tightly to let anyone through. Lena chances a touch -- her hand catches on Charley's hip, her lips close to Charley's ear long enough to ask, "You figured out what you wanted?"

Charley leans into the touch just as the crowd gives way. "Did you?" When she tries turning, their faces come too close. Her words come out breathless. "Lena or Mrs. Evans?"

"Lena." No hesitation.

"Lena, Lena, Lena." They get through the crowd.

Lena clicks in Charley's ear. "You're supposed to sing it."

They reach the doors. "You'll have to make me."

The cool of the air sends goosebumps down their arms, but it gives a good reason to huddle closer. To wrap around each other while they wait on the valet to bring one of their cars around.

Lena says, "I'm pretty sure nobody makes you do anything." And it's true, but Charley offers her this:

"I thought you liked a challenge."

 

/

 

**v. roll credits, cut to the villain's comeuppance**

Davis screams into the phone the second Charley picks up. "Lena!" He scoffs, and he groans, and he probably slaps down his iPad from the sound of it. "That's how you played this? You fucked Felix's wife!?"

Charley flips the page on the magazine she's reading. It's probably the same one that Davis gets his information from. The cover shot's from the night at the club, of Charley and Lena wrapped around each other with barely a thing between them.

"Nice to talk to you, Davis. Did you want something?"

"Lena!"

"She's a little busy, but I could get her if you want." Now she's being petty, but she's earned the chance to be petty, hasn't she? Davis huffs on the other line, so lost in whatever he's trying to say that he can't get any words out. She turns on her stool to call down the hall. "Lena!"

"Charley, I cannot believe you would--"

Lena heads in. "Yeah? Who's on the phone?" Charley hands it over.

"Davis wants to say hi."

Lena takes it, puts it to her ear. "Hey Davis, how's New York?" He doesn't even answer, just hangs up. Lena pulls the phone back to check it and gives it back. "Hm, guess he didn't want to talk after all. Ooh, our first cover."

Charley jokes, "I'll blow it up like the others. Hang it in the office."

"You're really bad at being casual, you know that, right?"

Charley shrugs. "Why bother? I know what I want."

 

/

/

**Author's Note:**

> happy femslash february, and a very happy black history month ~


End file.
